Durban - THE SA Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu) welcomed the decrease of the Department of Education budget for sanitary pads from R109million to R27m.
The union felt people had been taking advantage of the need for sanitary pads, for their own commercial needs.
At the union’s media briefing, Nomarashiya Caluza, Sadtu provincial leader, said when the initial budget shot up to more than R100m, they called for an investigation.
The oversupply of sanitary pads has been previously reported and also that schools had stored them in libraries, storerooms, and at other schools, not knowing what to do with them.
Caluza felt that sanitary pads was an issue better suited to the Department of Social Development instead of the Education Department. She said that although they were the first people to report the matter to the department, they were not updated on the outcome of the investigations.
This was among the issues discussed at Sadtu’s provincial general council last week.
Security at schools was also discussed. Caluza said they were against the carrying of guns at schools. “We are not military schools and we are not in America,” she said. Caluza was speaking on the several incidents of violence, at schools in KZN.
Most recently a teacher at Masuku Primary School, in the Folweni area, was fatally shot last month on his way to his classroom. Days later, two security guards were attacked at Folweni Secondary School. One of them died.
“It is our strongly considered view that school violence should be seen as the national crisis that it is and that there must be adequate resourcing to facilitate the implementation of the National Schools Safety Framework that has been developed almost a decade ago, from an infrastructure and personnel point of view,” she said.
Caluza hoped police would focus on what happened in Folweni, as there appeared to be a number of violent incidents in the area.
Education spokesperson Kwazi Mthethwa said it was not for them to question the treasury department’s reasoning regarding the sanitary pads budget issue.
He believed treasury came to that decision after consultation. Mthethwa said there were individuals and non-governmental organisations, who were providing sanitary pads, and the department was working with them.